2Theory

We noted that the definition of territoriality contains three interrelated facets. Territoriality must provide a form of classification by area, a form of communication by boundary, and a form of enforcement or control. What will be argued now is that approximately seven other potential effects can be linked to these three facets, and that they, plus the original three, lead to approximately fourteen combinations of characteristics. Note that the precise number is not the critical issue. They can be collapsed into fewer than ten or fourteen. What is critical is that the definition of territoriality be rich enough to delimit the range of potential advantages offered by a territorial strategy and at a level of generality that is precise and useful. Specifying these effects, how they are connected to one another, and the conditions under which they would be employed constitute the theory of territoriality.

The theory will be presented in two parts. First, territoriality is conceptu­ally abstracted from the multiplicity of social-historical contexts. This allows room to describe the internal logic of territoriality: to reveal the range of effects which constitute the domain of reasons for using territorial as opposed to non-territorial strategies and their logical interrelationships. Second, the theory hypothesizes that certain historical contexts will draw upon specific potential effects and, in a very general sense, matches historical contexts with territorial effects.

The theory is both empirical and logical. The first three tendencies are derived from the definition of territoriality. The others, while not entirely derivable from the definition, none the less are logically interconnected and linked to it. Calling the following analysis a theory does not mean that we are taking a mechanistic approach to people and their uses of territory. On the contrary, the theory will present the effects of territory as possibilities which range from the physical to the symbolic: a range spanned by the broad field of spatial analysis. Nor does the word theory mean that accurate predictions about territoriality can be made. Human behavior is far too ‘open ended’ to

28

Theory 29

make possible precise social predictions of any consequence. Rather, by theory, is meant that we can disclose a set of propositions which are both empirically and logically interrelated and which can help make sense out of complex actions. In other words, the theory can help us understand and explain, but it is not likely to help us predict precisely what will happen in the future.

The complex structure of the theory may be more easily pictured if we resort to an analogy from physical science. Noting that the theory contains- two parts - the range of effects and their uses in historical cases - we can say, at the risk of being branded mechanistic, that the first part is analogous to examining the ‘atomic’ structure of territoriality: the three facets (classifica­tion, communication, and enforcement) are its ‘nucleus’ and the ten primary and fourteen combinations. of effects or tendencies are its ‘valences.’ These form the potential links that will be drawn upon if and when territoriality is used. The second part is analogous to placing ter­ritoriality in a periodic table of types of social-historical organizations and suggesting bondings that can be expected when these contexts use ter­ritoriality. Sketching the bonds between historical contexts and territorial effects will be the purpose of the subsequent chapters.

Before turning to the theory itself, a few more words about method and terminology are in order. Territoriality’s effects are not simple relation­ships. Because they pertain to people, not to atoms, they are more appropriately termed potential ‘reasons’ or ‘causes’ of, or potential ‘conse­quences’ or ‘effects’ of, territoriality. The appropriateness of one set of names over the other depends on whether an individual (or group) is establishing new territories (in which case the appropriate couplet would be reasons/causes) or are using already existing ones (in which case the appropriate couplet would be consequences/effects). As to whether some­thing is a reason or a cause, or a consequence or an effect, is impossible to know without looking closely at the specific case. And even then there are many who argue that little difference exists between the two. For the sake of simplicity, reasons, causes, consequences, effects, will be used interchange­ably to show that these are applicable in any case; and the terms ‘potentiali­ties’ or ‘tendencies’ will cover all four options.

Despite this effort at simplification, the theory is still complex and technical. We will need to describe ten tendencies and fourteen combina­tions of tendencies for a total of twenty-four effects. This is unavoidable. The theory must be developed as fully as possible early on since the historical chapters are organized around the claims of the theory. Each of the twenty-four effects will be given a common-sense name. In addition, to help distinguish the theory’s internal structure, the first ten will each be assigned a number and the fourteen combinations a letter (e.g., the first tendency - classification - will be identified as 1 , and the third combination -

complex hierarchy - will be identified as c). The numbers and letters will be used only in this chapter for cross referencing. The remainder of the book will refer to the tendencies and combinations by their names. Omitting the letters and numbers may make it more difficult for the reader to be alerted by the fact that a particular tendency is being addressed. But using only the name of the effect will still allow the reader to identify it as such while making the theoretical structure less obtrusive and distracting to the narrative.

The social construction of territoriality

Conceptually isolating and describing territoriality to some degree apart from particular social contexts may seem analogous to the quest for the meaning of geographic distance in spatial analysis.1 One critical difference is that territoriality is always, socially or humanly constructed in a way that physical distance is not. It can be granted that, in a rudimentary sense, the act of conceiving, describing, and measuring distances is a matter of social construction, and so too are the social forces that place things in certain patterns in space. But territoriality is even more intimately involved with social context. Territoriality does not exist unless there is an attempt by individuals or groups to affect the interactions of others. No such attempt, nor indeed no interaction at all, need exist between two objects in space for there to be a specifiable distance between them.2 Distances can be compared and measured, but there is little that can be said abstractly about their potentials to affect behavior. Their influence depends on there being actual channels of communication such as roads, railways, and the like, which contain these distances. Indiscriminate substitution of the physical measure of distance for the physically and socially significant channels of communica­tion or interactions runs the risk of treating distance non-relationally.3

Unlike distance, territorial relationships are necessarily constituted by social contexts (however general) in which some people or groups are claiming differential access to things and to others. Because of this, more can be said abstractly about the effects of territoriality than can be said about distance, and yet, because territoriality is a product of a social context, whatever is said about it, no matter how abstract, can have normative implications affixed to it and thus can lead back to a social context. It is important to make clear that these normative implications refer to judg­ments people make about the uses of territoriality. An effect of territoriality may be considered by some as good, or neutral, or bad. Most may agree that using territoriality to prevent children from having access to plates in the kitchen can be an effective and even a benign strategy. Yet to a few it may be deceitful because the parent does not have to disclose to the children which objects they are not allowed to touch. The nqrmative implications people

30 Human territoriality

Theory 31

assign to actions, and in this case territorial actions, are important parts of their effects. A parent may realize territoriality is efficient, but may not use it because he believes it is deceitful. The theory then must have room for the ethical and normative judgments that can be assigned by others to the uses of territoriality. This helps link the theory to society. Yet the theory itself will not present procedures by which one can judge whether an action is, on its own merits, good or bad.

When presenting the tendencies, the social contexts will be pushed far into the background (though specific examples are used to clarify their meanings, they should not be interpreted as specifying the context of the tendency) and the general normative implications will not be addressed until the combinations are discussed. Indeed, some of the combinations differ from one another in the degree to which they draw upon what others may label as benign or malevolent connotations. These normative terms are still intended to be very abstract and general. But by way of an illustration we may consider that a benign context to some may mean that a relationship is non-exploitative. Such a context might be approached at an individual level when a parent uses territoriality to prevent a young child from running into traffic; and at a group level when the workers of a democratically organized and controlled factory elect some of the members to serve for terms as managers. A malevolent territorial relationship, on the other hand, might be thought to occur when differential access through territoriality benefits those exercising territoriality at the expense of those being controlled.4

Keeping the descriptions of the tendencies neutral and the normative meanings of the combinations general helps to separate the expression of the theory of territoriality from particular theories of power and society. This allows territoriality an intellectual ‘space’ of its own and prevents terri­toriality from becoming the captive of any particular ethical theory or theory of power. The second part of the theory draws upon the capacity of these tendencies to have normative implications and thus to point to particular types of social contexts that may employ them. In this way the theory can be reconnected to specific historical cases and to theories of power.

Theory: part 1

Ten tendencies o f territoriality

By definition, territoriality, as an assertion of control, is a conscious act, yet the person(s) exercising territoriality need not be conscious of the ten potentials or tendencies for these effects to exist. These tendencies of territoriality come to the fore, given certain conditions. Moreover, they are not independent of one another. In fact, the first three listed below - classification, communication, and enforcement - can be considered logi­

cally (though not empirically) prior. They are the bases by which the other seven potentialities of territoriality are interrelated, and any or all of the ten can be possible reasons for its use. Even if the first three are not important as reasons in some instances, they must nevertheless still be present because they are part of the definition. In other words, territoriality must provide classification, communication, and enforcement, but it can be ‘caused’ by one or several or all of the ten. Let us proceed in order from number 1 to number 10 and again be reminded that the terms used to describe them could apply to benign, neutral, or malevolent social contexts. (Each tendency is numbered and the italicized word(s) will serve as the name(s) of the tendency in subsequent chapters.) As the second section will show, tendencies are logically interconnected in numerous ways. The following is more a list of definitions of the tendencies than an illustration of their interrelationships. Yet the order in which they are discussed suggests how some lead to others.

*

1. Territoriality involves a form of classification that is extremely efficient under certain circumstances. Territoriality classifies, at least in part, by area rather than by type. When we say that anything in this area or room is ours, or is off limits to you, we are classifying or assigning things to a category such as ‘ours’ or ‘not yours5 according to its location in space. We need not stipulate the kinds of things in place that are ours or not yours. Thus territoriality avoids, to varying degrees, the need for enumeration and classification by kind and may be the only means of asserting control if we cannot enumerate all of the significant factors and relationships to which we have access. This effect is especially useful in the political arena, where a part of the political is its concern with novel conditions and relationships.

2. Territoriality can be easy to communicate because it requires only one kind of marker or sign - the boundary. The territorial boundary may be the only symbolic form that combines direction in space and a statement about possession or exclusion. Road signs and other directional signs do not indicate possession. The simplicity of territoriality for communica­tion may be an important reason why it is often used by animals.

3. Territoriality can be the most efficient strategy for enforcing control, if the distribution in space and time of the resources or things to be controlled fall well between ubiquity and unpredictability. For instance, models of animal foraging have shown that territoriality is more efficient for animals when food is sufficiently abundant and predictable in space and time whereas non-territorial actions are more suitable for the converse situation. The same has been shown to hold in selected cases of human hunting and gathering societies.5

4. Territoriality provides a means of reifying power. Power and influence

32 Human territoriality

Theory 33

are not always as tangible as are streams and mountains, roads, and houses. Moreover, power and the like are often potentialities. Ter­ritoriality makes potentials explicit and real by making them ‘visible.’

5. Territoriality can be used to displace attention from the relationship between controller and controlled to the territory, as when we say ‘it is the law of the land’ or ‘you may not do this here.’ Legal and conven­tional assignments of behavior to territories are so complex and yet so important and well understood in the well-socialized individual that one often takes such assignments for granted and thus territory appears as the agent doing the controlling.

6. By classifying at least in part by area rather than by kind jDr type, territoriality helps make relationships impersonal. The modern city, by and large, is an impersonal community. The primary criterion for belonging is domicile within the territory. The prison and work place exhibit this impersonality in the context of a hierarchy. A prison guard is responsible for a block of cells in which there are prisoners; the guard’s domain as supervisor is defined territorially. The same is true of the relationship between the foreman and the workers on the assembly line, and so on.

7. The interrelationships among the territorial units and the activities they enclose may be so complicated that it is virtually impossible to uncover all of the reasons for controlling the activities territorially. When this happens territoriality appears as a general, neutral, essential means by which a place is made, or a space cleared and maintained, for things to exist. Societies make this place-clearing function explicit and permanent in the concept of property rights in land. The many controls over things distributed in space (as the interplay between preventing things without the territory having access to things within and vice versa) become condensed to the view that things need space to exist. In fact, they do need space in the sense that they are located and take up area, but the need is territorial only when there are certain kinds of competition for things (in space). It is not competition for space that occurs but rather a competition for things and relationships in space.6

8. Territoriality acts as a container or mold for the spatial properties of events. The influence and authority of a city, although spreading far and wide, is ‘legally’ assigned to its political boundaries. The territory becomes the object to which other attributes are assigned, as in the case of the political territory being the unit receiving federal support.

9. When the things to be contained are not present, the territory is conceptually ‘empty.’ Territoriality in fact helps create the idea of a socially emptiable place. Take the parcel of vacant land in the city. It is describable as an empty lot, though it is not physically empty for there may be grass and soil on it. It is emptiable because it is devoid of socially

or economically valuable artifacts or things that were intended to be controlled. In this respect, territoriality conceptually separates place from things and then recombines them as an assignment of things to places and places to things. As we shall see, this tendency can be combined with others to form an extremely important component of modernity - that of emptiable space.

10. Territoriality can help engender more territoriality and more relation­ships to mold. When there are more events than territories or when the events extend over greater areas than do the territories, new territories are generated for these events. Conversely, new events may need to be produced for new and empty territories. Territoriality tends to be space-filling.

These are brief descriptions of the ten consequences that we hypothesize could come from the use of territorial organization and that would be drawn upon to explain the reasons for having territorial, as opposed to non- territorial, activity. Once again, these tendencies are not independent and their precise number and definition is not as critical as the question of whether or not they circumscribe the domain of its potential effects. Not all of them need be used in any particular territorial instance in history, and (as mentioned) their meanings or imports would depend on the specific histori­cal conditions of who controls whom, how, and for what purpose. Some of their interconnections were noted and more will become apparent as we discuss the primary combinations.

34 Human territoriality

Primary combinations

Most of human behavior occurs with hierarchies of territorial organizations: individuals live in cities, which are in states, which are in nations. People work at desks which are in rooms, which are in buildings. Hence everything we said about territories applies, in addition, to hierarchical territorial organizations. For example, having territory used as a mold within a hierarchy of territories, as it is in the context of municipalities, states, and the nation, could mean that a goal, such as 4 percent unemployment, can be assigned precisely for one geographical level, such as the national, rather than for another, such as the state or the municipal. Assigning tasks or responsibilities to different territorial levels may become a general political strategy. Territoriality, as a means of circumscribing knowledge and responsibility, can be used to assign the lowest level and the smallest territory the least knowledge and responsibility and the highest level and largest territory the most.

In this vein, and still without being specific about social contexts, we can proceed to illustrate more of the logical interrelations among the tendencies

Theory 35

Tendency is important

Tendency is extremely important

C O M B IN A T IO N S

Hierarchy and bureaucracy

J Divide and conquer

Territorial definition of social relations

Mismatch and spillover

Obscuring by assigning wrong scale territory

Territoriality, an end, not a means

Social conflict obscured by territorial conflict-horizontal displ.

Long and short range planning

Obscuring by stages. Clear at macro level, unclear at local micro level

Efficient stipervision-span of control

Inequalities

Magic-representation becomes powerful in itself

Conceptually empty space

Figure 2.1 Internal links among tendencies and combinations

by considering the possible primary combinations and their general import within social hierarchies. We will begin with a list, as we did with the tendencies. This list will address the relationships of tendencies to combina­tions within hierarchies. The order of the list suggests how some of the combinations lead to others, but the major interconnections among the combinations will be discussed later.

Figure 2.1 is a matrix tracing the connections among the elementary tendencies (1-10)) to form the primary combinations (a to n). The array of combinations in Figure 2.1 is not alphabetical as is the order in the list of combinations. This is because Figure 2.1 groups the combinations discussed in the list by their mixtures of tendencies rather than by the interconnections

among the combinations. (The dynamics among the combinations are illustrated in Figure 2.2.)

Figure 2.1 shows only the important links. A darkened square signifies that a potential is extremely important, and a striped one that it is moderately important. A blank means that the tendency is not important for that particular combination. It does not mean that it has no effect at all. (Note again that whereas (1), (2), and (3) must be attributes of territoriality, they need not be important causes/consequences of territoriality. Their inclusion in the matrix is to indicate when they, as characteristics of territoriality, also become important consequences of territory.) Without linking territoriality to specific social contexts, it is impossible to be more precise about the degree to which each tendency contributes to a combina­tion or whether a darkened area can be called a necessary and/or sufficient condition. It should not be forgotten that some combinations differ only in the connotations and weights placed on their tendencies.

a. Perhaps the most general combination is that all ten tendencies can be important components of complex and rigid hierarchies. (1), (2), (3), (6), and (5) are especially important, for they can allow hierarchical circum­scription of knowledge and responsibility, impersonal relationships, and strict channels of communications, all of which are essential components of bureaucracy. The strength of (8), impersonal relations, affects the degree to which the bureaucracy is modern, according to Weber’s criterion.7

b . Not only can the scope of knowledge be graded according to territorial levels, but so too can the scope of responsibility in space and time through enforcing (3) and molding (8) access to information. Long-term planning could be made the responsibility of the highest level which would have access to the greatest knowledge and responsibility and short-term planning (or no planning at all) would be the responsibility of the lowest territorial level. Moreover, an action could be subdivided into stages: the first having to do with overall initiation of policy and the last having to do with carrying out of the details. The first would pertain to the higher territorial levels, the last to the lower levels.

c. Upper echelons of a hierarchy tend to use territories to define (1), enforce (5) and mold (5) groups, with the result that members may be collected and dealt with impersonally (6). It is this cluster (1,3,6, and 8) to which the historical-anthropological literature points when it discusses the territorial definition o f social relationships.8 This is a relative concept and its opposite is a social definition o f territory. The difference between them is a matter of degree. A relatively extreme case of a territorial definition of social relations can be found in our previous comparison of membership in a twentieth-century North American community as

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Theory 37

compared with membership in the Chippewa community. Yet even in North America both territorial and social definitions can be found in the same place. The requirement for receiving police, legal, and fire protec­tion from an American municipality is that one be located within the geographical bounds of that community. Those who do not even reside there but simply pass through receive these benefits. On the other hand, within the same city, being a visitor in someone’s house does not make the visitor a part of the household and does not give the visitor the right to use the household’s resources. An actual claim to territoriality may involve elements of both, as when full political citizenship in American municipalities, although granted on the basis of residence, is still given only to U.S. citizens. As we noted in the Chippewa example, primitive societies rely almost entirely on a social definition of territoriality whereas civilizations and especially modern societies do the opposite. Continuous and intense territorial definitions lead, as we shall see, to a conceptually emptiable space (3),

d. A significant yet simple combination is that the hierarchical territorial circumscription (3) of knowledge and responsibility can provide a very efficient means of supervision. For example, constraining the movements of prisoners by placing them in cells makes easier the task of supervising them than if they were allowed to roam freely in the prison. Indeed, even a prison without cells but with an outside wall provides a more effective means of supervision than a non-territorial form of contact such as handcuffing a prisoner to a guard. An important quantitative index of the degree of supervisory efficiency would be the span o f control, i.e., the number of supervisors per supervisees. This measure is a well-known index of organizational structure and is exhibited by all territorial organizations.9

e. The combination of elements constituting a territorial definition of social relationships {1,3,6, and 5) in conjunction with a neutral space-clearing device (7), and especially a conceptually empty place (9) point to the possibility, on a practical level, of continually filling, emptying, and rearranging things in a territorial mold for the purpose of efficient functional control. This constant manipulation of things within a territory would lead, on an abstract level, to a conceptual separation and recom- > bination of things and space and thus to a conceptually emptiable space. Space - not just place as in (9) - would appear as an efficient functional framework for events. Events and space would seem to be only con­tingently related. This possibility is especially significant in modern society and characterizes the conception of territory most closely linked with modern modes of thought. Science, technology, and capitalism make practical the idea of repeatedly and efficiently ‘filling’ and ‘empty­ing’ and moving things about within territories of all scales. Planners

expect states to lose or gain population year by year, and federal support to states allows for such changes. On a smaller scale, factory buildings serve as territorial molds or containers to house first one industry, then another, or when no one rents the building, to contain nothing at all. Geographical mobility and territorial power at the political level, and emptying, filling, and arranging at the architectural level, loosen the bonds between events and location and present territory and space as a background for the occurrence of events, a background that can be described abstractly and metrically. Changes in activities are especially prevalent in modern culture. Consumer society makes change essential. Geographically, change and the future are seen as sets of spatial con­figurations different from those that exist now or that existed in the past. A place that has not changed its appearance has been bypassed by time; it * has stood still. Planning for change and thinking of the future means imagining different things in space. It involves imagining the separation and recombination of things in space. Territoriality serves as a device to keep space emptiable and tillable.10

/. The combinations of reification (4) and displacement (5) could lead to a magical mystical perspective. Reification through territory is a means of making authority visible. Displacement through territory means having people take the visible territorial manifestations as the sources of power.

,The first makes the sources of power prominent, whereas the second disguises them. When the two are combined they can lead to a mystical view of place or territory. This often occurs within religious uses of space. For example, Catholicism reifies when it makes the distinction between the primary sources of power (i.e., faith and the Church invisible) and the physical manifestations of these (i.e., the Church visible). But Catholic­ism displaces when it has worshippers believe that the physical structures of the Church and its holy places emanate power. The same relationships occur in nationalism. The territory is a physical manifestation of the state’s authority, and yet allegiance to territory or homeland makes territory appear as a source of authority.11

g. The territorial component in complex organizations can have a momen­tum of its own, on the one hand increasing the need for hierarchy and bureaucracy and on the other diminishing their effectiveness. This can come about when definition by area (1) leads (unintentionally) to the circumscription of the wrong area or the wrong scale and thus to a mismatch of territory or a spillover of process. The mismatch may become aggravated by using the territory as a mold (S). Mismatch and spillover would diminish the organization’s effectiveness; but because knowledge and responsibility within the organization are unequally shared, responsibility for rectifying the problem may fall to the existing hierarchy and thus entrench and even increase the role of bureaucracy.

38 Human territoriality

Theory 39

h. Displacement (5) and territorial multiplication (10) make it easier for the territory to appear to be the end rather than the means of control. (Appear is emphasized because territoriality, as a strategy, is always a means to an end.) The Catholic Church offers an example of this. By the fifth century A.D., the powers of archbishops were measured in part by the numbers of dioceses and parishes under their control. In order to increase this power, an archbishop would subdivide his see and thereby increase the number of bishops and priests under his supervision.

i. The territorial component can have a momentum of its own to create . inequalities. Its facility in helping to enforce differential access to things

(3) can become,institutionalized in rank, privilege, and class. j. The same tendencies that contribute to effective organization and

bureaucracy, as discussed in (a), could change their import by being used as a general means of dividing and conquering and making the organiza­tion more entrenched and indispensable for the coordination of the parts. In the context of the work place, the ten tendencies can be used to ‘de- skill’ a workforce and create factory discipline.12

k. Classification (7) and mold (5) especially can be used (unintentionally) to obscure the mismatch of territory and events by making people believe that the assignment of the particular tasks to the particular territories is indeed appropriate, when in fact the tasks are assigned to the wrong scale. An example of this would be assigning major responsibility for funding pollution abatement to local levels of government when in fact the sources of particular pollutants are not local.

I, Displacement (5) and territorial multiplication (10) could direct attention away pom causes o f social conflict to conflicts among territories them­selves. Examples of this can be seen in the attention given to the urban crises and to the conflicts between the inner city versus the suburbs and the Snowbelt versus the Sunbelt, rather than to social-economic relation­ships causing the conflicts.

m. Molding (8) the geography of actions at various scales, coupled with enforcing long- and short-range planning responsibilities to correspond­ing levels of the hierarchy (3), gives organizations the opportunity to obscure the geographic impact o f an event. This occurs by correctly specifying the geography at one scale, say the national, and not at the others, or by dividing a decision into parts, so that the initiation of an action (that may be irreversible) is considered in the context of the largest territory and the implementation of the action is left later to the smaller territories.13 A combination of the two is found in the history of the United States policy regarding nuclear power. It was decided at the national level that a significant fraction of our electricity would be generated by nuclear power. This goal pertained to the nation as a whole and was well under way before the decisions to locate the plants were

40 Human territoriality

made at the local levels and before the decisions to dispose of waste were even contemplated.

n. The same tendencies that could help to make hierarchical organizational control effective (1 , 2, 3, 6, and 8 or a and j) could backfire, leading instead to a reduction of control and even to secession. Dividing, conquering, de-skilling, and making relationships impersonal may be nullified or offset by the potentials they have of creating disorganization, alienation, and hostility. In many cases the assembly line went too far in circumscribing and de-skilling. Workers have reacted to senseless assign­ments and to alienation with various degrees of resistance, and industry has recently begun to explore new kinds of organizations aimed at decreasing the territorial circumscription of workers at the lower levels of the hierarchy.14 Moreover, those who resist circumscription can make use of the existing territories in various ways, as when prisoners literally take possession of cells and cell blocks, or as when political units secede. In cases where the seceding units take a territorial form, we would hypothesize that the reasons for employing territory would come from among the ten tendencies and their combinations.

These potentials, then, are not isolated and independent. The matrix in Figure 2.1, along with the preceding descriptions of the combinations, make it clear that some of the combinations use exactly the same tendencies as do others, but differ in the weights assigned to them and in the emphases placed on their connotations and normative meanings. For example, hierarchy and bureaucracy (a) and divide and conquer (/), and secession (n) all rely heavily on tendencies (1, 2, 3, 6, and 8) but they do so with different imports. Hierarchy and bureaucracy (a) can be thought of either as a benevolent or neutral organization using territory. Divide and conquer (j) emphasizes the negative aspects of ( i , 2 ,3,6, and 8) and describes what might be thought of as a malevolent organization. Secession (n) describes the condition wherein an individual or group uses territorial tendencies (1 ,2 ,3 ,6 , and 8) to lessen or remove the authority of others. Similarly, obfuscation by assigning the wrong scale territory (k) is the malevolent side of mismatch and spillover (g). Social conflict obscured by territorial conflicts places a different emphasis on the same tendencies than does territoriality as an end (h). Obfuscation by stages (in terms of time and scale) (m) is the negative side of long- and short-range planning (6); inequalities (/) is the negative side of efficient supervision - span of control (d).

These fourteen combinations along with the ten primary tendencies are potential reasons/causes, consequences/effects of territoriality that are linked to our definition. The remainer of the book will illustrate that these delimit the domain of potential advantages at a precise and general enough level to be historically significant. Some combinations, such as divide and

Theory 41

conquer, have been associated with territoriality before but most of the tendencies and combinations have not. This is unfortunate because they are necessary components in understanding how even the familiar territorial effects operate. We understand more of territoriality’s role in dividing and conquering when we realize that territoriality allows the joint employment of the .ten tendencies or that using these ten with slightly different emphases can help organizations become hierarchical and bureaucratic or can help create organization inefficiencies rather than help them to divide and conquer.

Some of the combinations can be collapsed into more general categories, as in joining all combinations that can be obfuscatory (k, I, and m) - these indeed form an important component of modernity under capitalism accord­ing to Marxist theory, as we shall see, and some can even be further subdivided. Certainly they all can be made narrower as when mismatch by spillover (g) is replaced by the narrower economic concept of externality, or divide .and conquer (/) is replaced by the narrower example of nineteenth- century British colonial policy in Africa. But to do any of this runs the risk of being either too general or too specific. Again, that a definition and its entailments are at a proper level cannot be proven abstractly. We can only illustrate the utility of the theory by exploring case studies of territoriality.

Which potentials are more interrelated and what their interconnections look like constitute the theory’s internal dynamics and structure. Figure 2.1 provides some suggestions about more or less likely interconnections: about how some potentialities can reinforce and some negate others. Overall there is the suggestion that territoriality can help increase the efficiency of an organization (whether it be a state, a business, or a church) up to a point, and that it can help shift an organization’s goals from benign to malevolent. For instance, defining responsibilities territorially can be efficient, but it can also create inadvertent spillovers and mismatches when the territorial definition becomes a substitute for not knowing what it is that is being controlled. These inefficiencies can lead to the need for more hierarchy and larger territories to coordinate the spillovers and mismatches. But eventually central control will be impaired. This could result in local levels having greater autonomy de facto if not de jure. Defining responsibility by area can also be used intentionally to obscure or disguise processes, increase the advantages of those in control, and shift the organization from benign to malevolent.

Some of these suggestions are illustrated in Figure 2.2. This diagram begins with the assumption (illustrated by the straight path to ‘a’) that the original goals of the organization are benign or neutral and that the institution draws from among the tendencies of territoriality to increase its hierarchical control. But some of the internal loops and tipping points suggested above may take hold and make the organization inefficient. This

42 Human territoriality

MO

0 “ "W “ ®

[" | General modern and pre-modern organizational effects

Modern organizational effects only

Figure 2.2 Flows, loops, and tipping points

can increase local autonomy and even fragment the organization, or it can push the organization away from neutrality to a malevolent state of dividing and conquering those that it is controlling. The circles point to loops that are especially prevalent in modern society.

These are only a few of the many possibilities arising from the intercon­nections among the potentials. In order to follow them further, the theory must become more explicit about the types of social context that will be employing particular potentialities of territoriality. Indeed, it must be remembered that social context has never been completely ignored. To a very general degree it is woven into the definition of territoriality itself. We have only pushed it into the background, more so with the tendencies and less so with the combinations. The logic of territoriality can carry the discussion still further, but only by combining it with more and more explicit types of social contexts which can be expected to utilize territoriality. Social context must now come into the foreground in order to fill in more of the internal structure of the theory, just as the periodic table of elements must be available for the atomic structure of an atom to make sense.

Theory 43

Theory: part II

Bondings: history and theory

Social science is acquainted with numerous types and modes of societies. To focus the discussion we will concentrate on social models of Weber and Marx. In addition to being enormously influential, these models have addressed a broad range of social organizations and have a great deal to do with territorial structure. By no means are they the only models to which the theory can be combined.

Weber Two facets especially to Weber’s work have a bearing on our discussion. The first considers the internal dynamics of organizations and especially of bureaucracies, and the second addresses the historical-social context in which certain organizations are more or less likely to occur.

Taking the second first, we note that Weber refers to three general or ideal types of organizations: charismatic, traditional, and bureaucratic. The first is not necessarily linked to any period or type of society.15 Its followers and leaders form a loose organization. There are few if any officers, rules of procedure, and clear hierarchies. But as the group persists, and especially as the question of succession arises, charisma becomes ‘routinized.’ It gives way to one or the other of two more formal types of organizations: the traditional and the bureaucratic.

As the name implies, traditional organizations are found primarily in pre­modern societies or civilizations containing social classes and complex divisions of labor. These organizations rely on traditional modes of conduct and problem solving. Often, the leadership is drawn from a specific clan, family, or circle of friends. Justification for authority is based on custom. Hierarchy can be very well developed and complex, but a person’s ability and personality may change the power and scope of his appointment. Legitimacy of authority is not drawn from holding an office proper but from being connected to traditional positions of leadership. Traditional organiza­tions occur throughout pre-modern civilizations and they characterize organizations when charisma becomes routinized. Many scholars have called such traditional hierarchies bureaucracies16 but Weber reserves thè term for organizational features found primarily in modern societies which include capitalistic and socialistic economies. We will follow the practice of calling all such organizations bureaucratic, but point to the degree to which they contain modern features such as the ones Weber notes. The routiniza- tion of charisma in modern society according to Weber would normally lead to bureaucratic organization. Bureaucracies, in Weber’s terms, are charac­terized by formal lines of communication, clear hierarchy and definitions of authority, and impersonal relations. These make hierarchical organizations modern.

44 Human territoriality

More specifically, Weber argues that:1) the individual office holders of modern bureaucracies are personally free and subject to authority only with respect to their impersonal official obligations. 2) The bureaucracies themselves are organized in clearly defined hierarchies of offices. 3) Each office has a clearly defined sphere of competence in the legal sense. 4) The office is filled by a free contractual relationship. 5) Candidates are selected on the basis of technical qualifications . . . [often] by examination or diplomas certifying technical training or both. Candidates are appointed, not elected. 6) They are remunerated by fixed salaries in money . . . The salary is primarily graded according to rank in the hierarchy. . . 7) The office is treated as the sole or at least the primary occupation of the incumbent. 8) It constitutes a career. There is a system of ‘promotion’ according to seniority or to achievement or both. Promotion is dependent on the judgment of superiors. 9) The official works entirely separated from ownership of the means of administration. 10) He is subject to strict and systematic discipline and control in the conduct of the office.17

Conversely, hierarchical (bureaucratic) organizations that are not modern tend not to have: a) a clearly defined sphere of competence subject to impersonal rules; b) a rational ordering of relations of superiority and inferiority; c) a regular system of appointments and promotions on the basis of a free contract or technical training; and d) fixed salaries. Note that impersonality is a major undercurrent in the list. The higher the degree of impersonality, the more modern the bureaucracy.

Much recent research on organizational structure has consolidated and extended Weber’s components and has contained specific suggestions about their interconnections. The objects of study have for the most part been twentieth-century Western industrial organizations but several of the vari­ables and their supposed interconnections can serve as guides to an analysis of pre-modern institutions.

These recent works, as with Weber’s, point to the significance of imper­sonality and impartiality within modern organizational and bureaucratic structures, and also suggest the following as important facets of organizations:

Specialization - which refers to the division of labor;Standardization - which refers to the extent of procedural regularity in the

organization;Formalization - which refers to the use of documentation for job defini­

tion and communication;Centralization - which refers to the locus of authority in the organization;Configuration - which refers to the shape of authority and hierarchy and

can often be summarized by span of control.

These are of course very general characteristics. More specific meanings differ considerably from study to study. Yet there is consensus that spe-

Theory 45

cialization, standardization, and formalization are strongly interrelated and are connected to the hierarchical structure of organizations and also to technology.18

Little modification has been made to the historical facet of Weber’s formulation, except that, as we noted, others have used the term bureaucracy more generally to describe the hierarchies in traditional organizations and have found within them some examples of modern bureaucratic facets, such as impersonal relations. Rather, most amend­ments have been made to the first aspect of Weber’s formulation, the description of processes occurring within modern organizations and bureaucracies, and here two avenues of research have a bearing on territoriality.

First, as we have just described, recent work on organizational structures has introduced such facets as standardization, formalization, centralization, and configuration, to consolidate components of Weber’s model. Second, research on organizations has explicitly addressed the normative implica­tions of bureaucracy. Weber saw the bureaucratic form as potentially the most rational and efficient. He recognized some of its negative features, such as its tendency to make relationships too uniform and impersonal, which would cause the organization to dissolve or split apart and could create opportunities for charismatic leaders to form new ones. But he was most impressed with bureaucracy’s positive potentials of rationality and efficiency. Overall he presented the bureaucracy as an instrument with the potential to do good.

Bureaucracy’s negative side was investigated and elaborated more fully ^ by Weber’s successors, especially Michels and Merton. Michels examined German socialist organizations and found that, despite their idealistic and egalitarian beginnings, these organizations became increasingly institution­alized, authoritarian, and hierarchically rigid; and the officials became more interested in perpetuating themselves and their offices than in their commit­ment to thé original goals of the organization.19 This trend he attributed to bureaucracies in general and called it the ‘iron law of oligarchy.’ Merton disclosed another malevolent side to bureaucracy. An emphasis on strict formal procedures, discipline, and rules, he argued, leaves officials with the view that adherence to formal procedures is an end in itself.20 This Merton called ‘displacement.’

Many other studies of bureaucracy’s problems can be cited, and their collective import is that although Weber’s characterization was not wrong, there is more to the internal dynamics of bureaucracies which often leads them away from efficiency and benign or neutral effects. Granted, then, that organizations are dynamic, that modern society has complex hierarchical organizations with particular characteristics which Weber calls bureaucratic, and that traditional societies possess traditional though often

complex hierarchies with few modern bureaucratic characteristics, how can this be linked to territoriality?

The union occurs because many of these dynamics are mirrored in the logic of territoriality and because both traditional and modern organizations have employed territoriality as integral parts of their structures. Joining research on modern facets of organization with territoriality can lead to the following expectations. In very general terms, the theory would suggest that in both traditional and modern society territoriality could increase organiza­tional efficiency, centralization, and span of control, but again up to a point. The theory also anticipates, as in Figure 2.2, that tipping points can be reached making it possible for territoriality to weaken an institution. The territorial units can secede or become captured by another organization. The process may be subtle as when territorial units engender bureaucratic inefficiencies and become ends in themselves. If we focus especially on modern facets of bureaucracy, we can expect that in modern society, but also to some degree in pre-modern ones (as will be shown in our discussion of the Catholic Church), territoriality’s facility in providing ease of classi­fication, communication, and control could also increase specialization, standardization, and formalization up to a point. The expression ‘up to a point’ must be emphasized again because the society in which these organizations occur has much to do with the specifics of these relationships and because the critical tipping points in the internal dynamics of the theory can again eventually come to bear to counter some of these effects. These tipping points are the territorial equivalents to bureaucracy’s conservative and oligarchical effects.

The theory’s internal logic can be refined to yield even more specific relationships when the type of organization using territoriality is more clearly defined. As we shall see in Chapter 6, for modern centralized bureaucratic organizations like the military, the school, and the factory, specifiable quantitative relationships can be expected to hold among degrees of territoriality, span of control, hierarchy, task complexity, and tech­nology.

Whereas many of the relationships between territoriality and complex hierarchical social divisions of labor can be present to varying degrees in practically any organization, we should not lose sight of the fact that some would predominate in modern society. This means that many of terri­toriality’s uses within an organization depend on the society in which the organization occurs. Governments of empires and modern states have territorially subdivided their domains because territoriality can provide these organizations with advantages. But just as there are differences between traditional organizations and modern bureaucracies, so too are there differences in the territorial effects they employ. Comparing the dynamics of these types of organizations with the potential dynamics of

46 Human territoriality

liieory ‘M

territoriality can help specify the conditions of each. For instance, tradi­tional organizations, unlike modern bureaucracies, would not be expected to emphasize territoriality’s effects of creating impersonal relationships and of conceptually emptying space.

Still there are the fascinating and important cases of pre-modern organiza­tions containing some of these modern effects. As we shall see, the Catholic Church is a case in point, but so are the Chinese Mandarin system of selecting officials and the English feudal system of King’s Courts. These systems possessed territorial devices to help keep relationships impersonal. One such device was to rotate officials from one territory to another, or at least not to assign an official to his native region.

Marx A second major social theory that could be linked fruitfully with territoriality is Marxism. Marx did not examine the possibility of bureaucratic dynamics as an independent phenomenon. Rather his writings discuss bureaucracy as an institution to be manipulated by class power. This is because Marx taught that the social division of labor, as manifested in ranks, specializations, and roles, is determined by the economic division of labor. The twists and turns of bureaucracy are linked to the development of economic classes and their interrelationships. Once communism removes class conflict, the state, as an agent of oppression, would wither away. Marx did not directly address the question of whether bureaucracy would also wither away along with the state, but in his early critique of Hegel he sees socialism as simplifying the bureaucratization of the state.21 Recently Marxists have recognized that bureaucratization is a force to be reckoned with in socialist countries, if not in the utopian world of communism. The Soviet bureaucracies have internal dynamics and contradictions of their own. The oligarchical tendencies of government bureaucracy, for instance, can create the equivalent of class structure and interests, and their forms, imports, and dynamics are effected by their social-historical contexts.22 This literature, then, could add further specifications to the directions and imports of the dynamics within bureaucracy.

More directly to our purposes is that the Marxists’ theory of class conflict in capitalism, when applied to territoriality, would single out the obfuscatory combinations of territoriality (k, /, and m) as the most important in the later stages of capitalism.23 The obfuscatory combinations would be expected because of the general tendency of capitalism to disguise class conflict and because of the peculiar position of the state vis-à-vis labor and capital which has a particularly important bearing on the theory of the state. On the one hand the state tries to maintain capitalism, and on the other it must contain or reduce class conflict, claiming to be the champion of the people and a vehicle for providing public goods. This dual role means that the sources and forms of power must often be disguised and the obfuscatory tendencies of

48 Human territoriality

territoriality could help do this. Territorial obfuscation need not be applied only at the state or local-state level. It could appear as well in the work place, the school, and in the realms of consumption.

Moreover, Marxist theory, in conjunction with a general analysis of modernity, points to the present and the recent past as the times to expect the most intense and frequent occurrence of emptiable space (e). This is because capitalism reinforces the view of space as a framework for the location and distribution of events. Capitalism helps turn place into com­modities. It helps us see the earth’s surface as a spatial framework in which events are contingently and temporally located. Capitalism’s need for capital accumulation and growth makes change paramount and, geographi­cally, change means a fluid relationship between things and space. The future is conceived of, and future actions produce, continual alterations of geographical relationships. Territoriality then becomes the mold for both filling space and defining and holding a space empty.

Weberians, as well as Marxists, would point to the fact that pre-modern civilizations may have differed in their uses of territoriality but that the differences in uses among them are in several respects not as great as the differences between their uses and those of modern society. They would also agree that only one other comparable historical watershed has occurred in territorial use, and that took place in the transition between primitive society and civilization. Marx, and Engels especially, characterize the primitive as essentially different from other pre-capitalist modes.24 To them, the primitive means small-scale egalitarian society with few if any institutions of oppression. The primitive’s use of territoriality would be quite different from that found in civilizations, whether pre-capitalist or capitalist. For instance, in primitive society one would not expect to find frequent or intense use of territoriality to form impersonal relations (6), to mold (8), conceptually to empty place (9), or to multiply territories (10), and one would not expect to find most of the combinations, especially territorial definition of social relationships (c).

There is much more that could be said about the links between the theory of territoriality and Marxist, Weberian, or other theories of power and organization. More specific connections can and will be made later in the book and examined in concrete historical cases. In discussing modernity in subsequent chapters we will be considering the interpretations of terri­toriality by neo-Smithians and neo-Keynesians as well as by Weberians and Marxians. But this sketch is sufficient to point to the possible areas upon which a history of territoriality should concentrate.

Figure 2.3 summarizes the principal relationships we mentioned between uses of territoriality and their association with those social-historical con­texts suggested especially by Marx, Weber, and a general understanding of history. It emphasizes the broad connection between territoriality and

Theory

□ General agreement that tendency is not significant

H General agreement that tendency is significant

//̂ Y/ Possibility that tendency is significant

1 Classification

2 Communication

3 Enforcement of access

4 Reification symbol

5 Displacement

6 Impersonal relations

7 Neutral space-clearing

8 Mold

9 Conceptually empty place

10 Multiplication of territories

a Hierarchy and bureaucracy

j Divide and conquer ““’i

n Secession

c Territorial definition of social relations

g Mismatch and spillover

k Obscuring by assigning wrong scale territory

h Territoriality, an end. not a means

1 Social conflict obscured by territorial conflict-horizontal displ.

% b Long and short range planning

m Obscuring by stages. Clear at macro level, unclear at micro level

d Efficient supervision-span of control

i Inequalities

Magic-representation becomes powerful in itself

e Conceptually empty space

Figure 2.3 Historical links

change in political economy. It thus considers an economic division of labor to be a primary factor in determining who controls whom and for what purposes. This does not mean of course that territoriality is unaffected by other economic as well as non-economic factors - indeed Figure 2.2 suggests how hierarchical organization is one such influence on territoriality. Rather it proposes that the most general territorial changes can be associated with changes in political economy. The two critical historical periods indicated in Figure 2.3 are the rise of civilizations and the rise of capitalism and modernity. (Although capitalism and modernity are not synonymous - the latter includes cultural and ideological components that are not reducible to economic terms - capitalism is an historically crucial element of modernism and for the sake of brevity the two terms will sometimes be used inter­changeably. So called ‘socialist’ countries such as the Soviet Union are also modern, but as there is little consensus about their political economic form, their use of territoriality will not be discussed separately.)

In the rise of civilizations, the most important novel effects of territoriality are its uses in governing others, in defining social relationships, in dividing, subduing, and organizing populations. The most important novel territorial effects accompauying the rise of capitalism are its uses in conceptually emptying space, in creating modern bureaucracies, and in obscuring sources of power. These are sketches of the overriding connections between histori­cal organization and territorial functions, and, along with Figure 2.2 and the general suggestions contained in Figure 1.2, will serve as the organizing models for the rest of the book.

Figure 2.3 summarizes ideas about the past, but so too does all written history, as opposed perhaps to what actually happened in the past. The succeeding chapters will attempt to show that the historical record (includ­ing what others than Marx and Weber have said about the past) tends to bear out these hypothesized associations. I use the words ‘tends to’ for several reasons. The span of time and space to be covered is vast. Only the highlights can be sketched which means judiciously selecting cases and sampling the vast quantity of secondary sources. Historical interpretation is in continuous flux; alternative views abound for practically any period as do debates about the period’s importance and duration. What capitalism is and when it became important is scarcely resolved. The same is true for other periods and social organizations. Although what Marx and Weber offer are general models (and models, especially social ones, are only partial and approxi­mate representations of reality), large numbers of more detailed historical studies can be found which tend to accept their general social typologies. Evidence from these detailed works will be used in the next chapter to flesh out the relationships suggested in Figure 2.3; and especially to highlight the two overall transitions - from primitive to civilized, and from pre-capitalist to capitalist. These changes will also be described in conjunction with

DU Human territoriality

Theory 51

changes in the conceptions and uses of space and time. Chapter 3, then, is an overview of the history of ‘Territoriality, space, and time.’

Figure 2.3 emphasizes the economic forces behind social-territorial rela­tionships. But it also suggests that several territorial effects, such as defining things by area, and enforcing access, can occur in any society, whereas others, such as the use of territoriality to make relationships impersonal and to increase span of control, can be found in all civilizations, but more so in modem than in pre-modern ones. In other words, institutions with modern characteristics can exist within pre-modern societies and vice versa. •Moreover, what is not described in Figure 2.3, but is implied in the general matrix of Figure 2.1 and is illustrated in Figure 2.2, is that the relationships among people and territory can undergo important changes while the society in which they occur does not. Even though the political economy of a society (at least at the level of generalization described in Figure 2.3) may remain the same, the territorial effects between people and within an organization, as illustrated by Figure 2.2, may have a dynamic of their own. Chapter 4, on the Church, will explore these possibilities by examining the internal territorial dynamics of Church organization and its relationship to . political economic change.

The Church is one of the most enduring and best-documented examples of an institution using territoriality as an integral part of its organization. The parish, the diocese, the archdiocese, and also the architectural partitioning of church buildings, clearly reveal the Church’s reliance on territoriality. These aspects of Church organization were developed differently during three major historical periods, the Classical, the Feudal, and the Modern.-** •Yet during the last period, the Church’s internal dynamics seem to have resisted many of the external political-economic changes accompanying modernization. In the Roman and Feudal periods, the territorial effects of the Church were far more modern than was the case with other institutions of the time, but by the end of the Middle Ages the same effects served to separate the Church from society and insulate it from social change, so that since the Reformation the Church stands more as an example of an archaic than a modern organization. This mixture of change and persistence, of internal dynamics and resistance to change, makes the Church an important case study of the interconnections among hierarchy, bureaucracy, and territoriality, from pre-modern times to the present.

Chapter 5,‘The American territorial system,’ will use the political forma­tion of North America, from the sixteenth century to the present, to concentrate again on the themes of modern territoriality use, especially their role in creating a concept of emptiable space, in facilitating bureaucracy, and in obscuring sources of power. Chapter 6, ‘The work place,’ will concentrate on how these same modern uses of territoriality have developed in the last 300 years at the local and architectural levels.